New Releases: October 20th-26th, 2022

This week, things get upsetting with Yomawari: Lost in the Dark’s peculiar forest and two titles priced at the ninety- and hundred-dollar mark. Fortunately, not everything is so damn expensive, with Pure-hearted Gyaru and the Shape of Happiness (pictured) and Pompom: The Great Space Rescue, available for much more reasonable amounts.

PlayStation 4
Batora: Lost Haven (digital, $19.99)
Garbage Pail Kids: Mad Mike and the Quest for Stale Gum (digital, $TBA)
Gas Station Simulator (digital, $19.99)
JoJo Siwa: Worldwide Party (physical & digital, $39.99)
Life in Willowdale: Farm Adventures (physical & digital, $39.99)
Miraculous: Rise of the Sphinx (physical $49.99 & digital, $39.99)
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord (physical & digital, $49.99)
New Tales from the Borderlands (physical, $49.99, digital, $39.99 and $49.99)
Norco (digital, $TBA)
Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin – Wanderer of the Rift (DLC, included with season pass)
Tempus (digital, $6.99)
Warhammer 40,000: Shootas, Blood & Teef (digital, $19.99)
Yomawari: Lost in the Dark (physical $49.99 & digital, $39.99)

PlayStation 5
Gotham Knights (physical & digital, $69.99, $89.99)
Life in Willowdale: Farm Adventures (physical & digital, $39.99)
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord (physical & digital, $49.99)
Seed of Life (physical, $29.99)

Switch
Aery – Last Day of Earth (digital, $9.99)
Apré Lapli [After the Rain] (digital, $10.99)
Backgammon: Board Game Puzzle (digital, $9.99)
Beholgar (digital, $9.99)
Crowalt: Traces of the Lost Colony (digital, $9.99)
Crystal Goddess (digital, $5.99)
CubicBan (digital, $2.99)
Dead Secret Circle (digital, $14.99)
Dire Vengeance (digital, $14.99)
Doomed to Hell (digital, $4.99)
Ducky Quacky (digital, $4.99)
Flying Neko Delivery (digital, $19.99)
Forest Pop (digital, $2.99)
Gas Station Simulator (digital, $19.99)
Harmonia (digital, $24.99)
Howloween Hero (digital, $9.99)
JoJo Siwa: Worldwide Party (physical & digital, $39.99)
Life in Willowdale: Farm Adventures (physical & digital, $39.99)
Lost Grimoires 2: Shard of Mystery (digital, $14.99)
Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope (digital, $59.99-$89.99)
Matchpoint – Tennis Championships (digital, $49.99)
Miraculous: Rise of the Sphinx (physical $49.99 & digital, $39.99)
New Tales from the Borderlands (physical, $49.99, digital, $39.99 and $49.99)
One More Island (digital, $19.99)
One True Hero (digital, $14.99)
Persona 5 Royal (physical & digital, $59.99)
Pompom: The Great Space Rescue (digital, $8.99)
Pure-hearted Gyaru and the Shape of Happiness (digital, $19.90)
Robotry! (digital, $12.49)
Runout (digital, $4.99)
Sea Horizon (digital, $14.99)
Seduced in the Sleepless City (digital, $29.99)
She Wants Me Dead (digital, $9.99)
Shutter Nyan! Enhanced Edition (digital, $13.49)
Super Mabus Mania (digital, $7.89)
Tempus (digital, $6.99)
The Jackbox Party Pack 9 (digital, $29.99)
The Walking Zombie 2 (digital, $9.59)
Touhou Gouyoku Ibun ～ Sunken Fossil World (digital, $25.19)
Turret Lab (digital, $3.99)
Warhammer 40,000: Shootas, Blood & Teef (digital, $19.99)
World Soccer Cup 2022 (digital, $4.99)
Yomawari: Lost in the Dark (physical $49.99 & digital, $39.99)

Xbox One
Aery – Last Day of Earth (digital, $9.99)
Batora: Lost Haven (digital, $19.99)
Garbage Pail Kids: Mad Mike and the Quest for Stale Gum (digital, $TBA)
Gas Station Simulator (digital, $19.99)
JoJo Siwa: Worldwide Party (physical & digital, $39.99)
Life in Willowdale: Farm Adventures (physical & digital, $39.99)
Miraculous: Rise of the Sphinx (digital, $39.99)
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord (physical & digital, $49.99)
New Tales from the Borderlands (physical, $49.99, digital, $39.99 and $49.99)
Park Story (digital, $18.49)
Persona 5 Royal (physical & digital, $59.99)
Robotry! (digital, $12.49)
Second Extinction (digital, $24.99, Game Preview)
Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin – Wanderer of the Rift (DLC, included with season pass)
Temple of Horror (digital, $9.99)
Tempus (digital, $6.99)
Warhammer 40,000: Shootas, Blood & Teef (digital, $19.99)

Xbox Series S/X
Gotham Knights (physical & digital, $69.99, $89.99)
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord (physical & digital, $49.99)
New Tales from the Borderlands (physical, $49.99, digital, $39.99 and $49.99)

PC
Batora: Lost Haven ($19.99)
Fhtagn Simulator ($TBA)
Flying Neko Delivery ($19.99)
Gotham Knights ($59.99)
Hell is Others ($TBA)
Horror Tycoon ($TBA)
King of the Hat ($TBA)
Monster Prom 3: Monster Roadtrip ($TBA)
New Tales from the Borderlands ($39.99)
Richman 11 ($TBA)
The Jackbox Party Pack 9 (digital, $26.99)
The Pegasus Expedition ($TBA)
Persona 5 Royal ($59.99)
Valkyrie of Phantasm ($TBA)
Void Scrappers ($TBA)
Warhammer 40,000: Shootas, Blood & Teef ($17.99)

Rob’s Pick: Talk about longevity- six years after the release of Joker’s exploits, Persona 5’s success shows few signs of slowing down. This week, Persona 5 Royal does the once assumed inconceivable, by showing up on PC, Switch, and Xbox. If you haven’t played P-Studio’s hit, this week’s offers three new ways to accomplish that, with an amazingly proficient port on Nintendo’s hardware. I wish I could say the same about that W40K title arriving this week (ahem!).

Looking beyond the obvious, Valkyrie of Phantasm blends two gems, Touhou Project characters and aerial, mecha-style combat. Sure, it’s not the first time this amalgam has been attempted, with 2020’s Touhou Mechanical Scrollery offering action and jank in equal measure. But I’m hopeful that Phantasm’s one-on-one battles provide focus. If it plays like Naruto Shippuden in the skies, I’ll be OK with it.

And yes, as a turn-based fan, I’ll eventually cave on Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope. But the trend of asking players to pay for a season pass upfront before revealing its contents should not be tolerated. C’mon folks, make publishers work for your money.

Matt R’s pick (editor, Shindig): The first two Yomawari games are, hands down, some of the best horror games of recent memory. Though certainly not the first to juxtapose a cute art style and chibi characters with grotesque sights and terrifying monsters, they took that idea to new heights, delivering eerie atmosphere, heartbreaking stories, and genuine terror in equal measure. Having a third one on the way in Yomawari: Lost in the Dark, with a haunting new story, new ghosts to hide from, and the option to customise your character’s clothes and hairstyle, is a perfect treat for Halloween.

Since Civilization VI made me a late convert to 4X strategy games, each new one that comes along catches my attention. This is particularly true of The Pegasus Expedition: a sci-fi strategy game that promises a particular focus on narrative, where “nothing is self-evident and every decision will have its consequences.” In a genre where stories tend to be emergent, rising more from interplay between systems and players’ experiences within those, I’m curious to see how The Pegasus Expedition handles something more authorial.

Touhou Project fans have a bit of choice this week: as well as Valkyrie of Phantasm that Rob mentioned, there’s also a Switch port of Touhou Gouyoku Ibun ~ Sunken Fossil World to look forward to. While Switch has plenty of Touhou, they’re mostly fangames; official games from Team Shanghai Alice don’t see ports nearly as often. Co-developed with Twilight Frontier, Sunken Fossil World eschews the usually shoot-’em-up format in favour a danmaku platformer.

Matt S’ pick (editor, DigitallyDownloaded): So, I’m going to start by saying Persona 5 Royal here. Because if I do Robert will be forced to put a screenshot of Ann underneath my picks this week and I do like seeing Ann. Having Ann on my Switch would be a wonderful thing so, even though I’ve played Persona 5 enough and don’t know if I’ll ever find the 130 hours it requires to play again, I’m going to buy it on Switch. Just in case.

Of the newer games this week, I must echo the Matt from across the ditch. Yomawari and its sequel had this utterly compelling way of taking humble, cute visuals and raking you over hot coals of terror with them. Give me a third of that and I’ll be a happy person this Halloween.

And finally, Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord. It’s almost scary how much time the Mount & Blade games can occupy, but they are such an incredible combination of open world RPG, brutal first-person combat and strategy that it’s hard to stop playing once you get lost in them. The first one worked surprisingly well on console (despite everyone predicting that it wouldn’t), so I’m keen on raising the flag and leading my patchwork armies into battle once again.

Ryan’s pick: I’m going to suggest Valkyrie of Phantasm this week as well. I’ve always liked versus games where two characters engage in an aerial battle with massive flashy attacks that home in on the opponent, and I suppose my affinity for this genre goes way back to the Virtual On days in the arcades. I think that if you are a danmaku fan this is definitely worth a try, especially if you are a fan of the Touhou series. I am a bit curious as to exactly how much content is in the game, but nevertheless I think it looks like it plays quite fast and looks impressive.

Another game that caught my eye this week is Void Scrappers on Steam. I love the 2D chaos that transpires onscreen in this game, and I can easily see myself enjoying both the hope and despair of a thousand things trying to attack me at all once. One final game that I haven’t had a chance to try on Steam that’s releasing on PS5 is Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord. With massive battles and up to 64 players playing together feels like it could lead me down the road to hilarity, and I have never been known to shy away from strolling down that path. I feel like I’ll probably play this one all wrong, but with battles being at such a large scale, hopefully my unorthodox approach towards battlecraft will go largely unnoticed.